This month was pretty uneventful in terms of work for my internship due to the TAKS testing and tutoring that has been occurring on my campus. I was however, able to finalize my internship plan and become familiar with the eight national technology facilitation standards. This was a tremendous learning experience for me because in reading about the specifics about the standards, I was able to gain a much better understanding of the roles of a technology facilitator and leader. The only standard that I still need to gain better understanding on is the eighth standard. It was very difficult for me to come up with an activity that I could do in my current position. I am still in my first year of teaching, and feel that a task that would satisfy that standard would be difficult because of my limited experience in my school and district. However, I am very excited to begin my activities for my internship, which will begin next month. May 2010:
Most of my internship plan is for work during the summer and during the next school year. Because of this, I have not done any work for my internship this month. However, I have had the change to think about and plan the different things I will be doing for the remainder of my internship. This summer, I plan to create a classroom website, which will increase parent-teacher and student-teacher communication throughout the school year. Also, I have been assigned as my campus C-Tech. This means I will be attending trainings on our district’s new grade book program, new curriculum access, and will be training the staff. These activities will be included as my internship hours. I am very excited to take on the new role on my campus, and be a role model for other teachers for use of technology.
I attended a training for the new grade book my entire district is adopting. The trainer was from Pearson, the company who created the grade book. I spent three hours at the training. It was a very quick basically over view of the program, and I think I am going to have to play around a lot to make sure the staff has a good understanding how to use it. My principal is requiring all staff members to use the program, because starting in January, the “parent portal” will open, in which parents will have the ability to log online and view all grades and assignments completed and entered by the teachers. I set up a date in August with my supervisor when I will teach the rest of the staff. I will have to create hand outs and plan my instruction. I will have only 45 minutes to teach them…so I better plan well! I am excited to complete more hours for my internship, as I have not had the chance to complete very many yet!
This was the first experience I have had with teaching my entire staff how to do anything. It was a very educational experience! I think I did a very good job with the technologies I had available. Unfortunately, the district had not installed the program onto all campus computers yet, and the “at home” access has not been enabled. Therefore, I had them follow along with what I was displaying. The other teachers were able to play around with the “training” mode, but were unable to add assignments. I used our computer lab, which was great for what I needed. It had a projector, projecting my computer. Each teacher was able to ask questions. They seemed overwhelmed, so I am planning on creating how-to documents with screen shots once the program is completely installed. Overall, this was a successful month, and I am ready to get back into the classroom and start school, and start with my new role as campus c-tech.
This has been a hectic month with the grade book. The software was not completely installed for teacher use until three weeks after school started; therefore, many teachers were coming to me with questions. I was able to assess understanding of the grade book, and created the “how-to” documents based on teacher questions. I received a lot of positive feedback, and all teachers were able to submit final grades successfully. As always with new technology, there are teachers who are resistant and negative, but I think I can change their mind J. I have started the planning of the video for the class website. After my last class (EDLD 5363), I feel more prepared to create a multimedia video and to upload it to the site. I will be having 6th graders do the acting/interviewing. This is a project I am looking forward to!
During this month, the hours for my internship went towards providing my team members with a couple of different tool to use for their classrooms. I attended one staff development and was able to carry that information learned into a hand out on how to use the program Comic Life. I also compiled a list of websites to use for rubrics. These were simple but helpful activities that I hope encourage the use of the tools and programs we have available. I continued to assist teachers with the new grade book program that I attended the staff development for in the summer. I created a couple more “how-to” documents with print screens and directions.
This month’s internship hours focused mainly on a lesson for my class about cyber safety and cyber bullying. It is important for students to understand the risks involved in the use of the Internet, as well as the effects of cyber-bullying. I discussed the information put on personal profile pages, such as Facebook. Many of my students have Facebook or Myspace already at the age of 8 and 9. Also this month I spent time teaching another staff member how to use a program I have used many times that allows students to easily create podcasts. It is such an easy program to use, and although the other teacher was unconfident in her technology abilities, she was surprised at how simple the program was. I hope to find time to teach other staff members to use the program soon. Also this month I continued to update my classroom website, to increase parent-teacher communication.
This was a short month due to Winter break; however I was able to get some hours in for my internship. Our class went on a field trip to the Dallas Aquarium, and I was able to update my site and put pictures of our trip. This increases parent knowledge about what is going on in my class in a simple way. Many teachers are still having difficulty with the new grade book; therefore I spent some hours assisting teachers with inputting their grades. There has been an issue with the work-skills section in the kindergarten grades, as they don’t give the same kind of grades as other grade levels. I am hoping all the issues will be sorting out with the technology department before the next grading period ends.
Our campus got Promethean Boards installed in October this year. Many teachers are reluctant to use the new technology, and need training. Even I am learning new things about the program every month. A great amount of our curriculum is available as a Word file, and my technology facilitator showed my how to create a PDF file and import it into the program used for our smart boards. This has increased my use of the board, as well as my teammates because I have been helping them and sending them some files to use. I also showed another teacher how to do the simple process. Because of this I have already seen an increase in the use of the technology. I plan to create a step-by-step document and send it to the staff. Creating the list of questions to ask my technology facilitator was informational. I am excited to ask them and learn about how Mesquite goes about planning and budgeting, as well as creating the leadership and vision for technology in the district.
I had a great time with my projects this month. I planned a multi-media project in which the students in my class created a podcast from their procedural writing. We went through the writing process in partners, and the partners then created a podcast with pictures. I have found from my past experiences with Garageband and creating these podcasts that it is easier to take pictures using Photo Booth. The students LOVED the program and sharing the final podcasts with each other and another 3rd grade class. This project displayed work for Technology Facilitator Standard II: Planning and designing learning environments and experiences. During this project, I assisted my team member in doing it with her class as well. I continued to update my classroom website and also helped a couple teachers with their promethean boards. I attended a C-Tech meeting, in which we learned about the new websites available for all students in the district.
Below are all of my Field-Based Activity Logs and Reflections for my Educational Technology Leadership Internship.April 2010:
April Activity Log.docx
- Details
- Download
- 22 KB
This month was pretty uneventful in terms of work for my internship due to the TAKS testing and tutoring that has been occurring on my campus. I was however, able to finalize my internship plan and become familiar with the eight national technology facilitation standards. This was a tremendous learning experience for me because in reading about the specifics about the standards, I was able to gain a much better understanding of the roles of a technology facilitator and leader. The only standard that I still need to gain better understanding on is the eighth standard. It was very difficult for me to come up with an activity that I could do in my current position. I am still in my first year of teaching, and feel that a task that would satisfy that standard would be difficult because of my limited experience in my school and district. However, I am very excited to begin my activities for my internship, which will begin next month.May 2010:
Most of my internship plan is for work during the summer and during the next school year. Because of this, I have not done any work for my internship this month. However, I have had the change to think about and plan the different things I will be doing for the remainder of my internship. This summer, I plan to create a classroom website, which will increase parent-teacher and student-teacher communication throughout the school year. Also, I have been assigned as my campus C-Tech. This means I will be attending trainings on our district’s new grade book program, new curriculum access, and will be training the staff. These activities will be included as my internship hours. I am very excited to take on the new role on my campus, and be a role model for other teachers for use of technology.
June 2010:
I have spent this month at home and have not completed any internship hours. Next month, however, I’m back in the game!
July 2010:
I attended a training for the new grade book my entire district is adopting. The trainer was from Pearson, the company who created the grade book. I spent three hours at the training. It was a very quick basically over view of the program, and I think I am going to have to play around a lot to make sure the staff has a good understanding how to use it. My principal is requiring all staff members to use the program, because starting in January, the “parent portal” will open, in which parents will have the ability to log online and view all grades and assignments completed and entered by the teachers. I set up a date in August with my supervisor when I will teach the rest of the staff. I will have to create hand outs and plan my instruction. I will have only 45 minutes to teach them…so I better plan well! I am excited to complete more hours for my internship, as I have not had the chance to complete very many yet!
August 2010:
This was the first experience I have had with teaching my entire staff how to do anything. It was a very educational experience! I think I did a very good job with the technologies I had available. Unfortunately, the district had not installed the program onto all campus computers yet, and the “at home” access has not been enabled. Therefore, I had them follow along with what I was displaying. The other teachers were able to play around with the “training” mode, but were unable to add assignments. I used our computer lab, which was great for what I needed. It had a projector, projecting my computer. Each teacher was able to ask questions. They seemed overwhelmed, so I am planning on creating how-to documents with screen shots once the program is completely installed. Overall, this was a successful month, and I am ready to get back into the classroom and start school, and start with my new role as campus c-tech.
September 2010:
This has been a hectic month with the grade book. The software was not completely installed for teacher use until three weeks after school started; therefore, many teachers were coming to me with questions. I was able to assess understanding of the grade book, and created the “how-to” documents based on teacher questions. I received a lot of positive feedback, and all teachers were able to submit final grades successfully. As always with new technology, there are teachers who are resistant and negative, but I think I can change their mind J. I have started the planning of the video for the class website. After my last class (EDLD 5363), I feel more prepared to create a multimedia video and to upload it to the site. I will be having 6th graders do the acting/interviewing. This is a project I am looking forward to!
October 2010:
During this month, the hours for my internship went towards providing my team members with a couple of different tool to use for their classrooms. I attended one staff development and was able to carry that information learned into a hand out on how to use the program Comic Life. I also compiled a list of websites to use for rubrics. These were simple but helpful activities that I hope encourage the use of the tools and programs we have available. I continued to assist teachers with the new grade book program that I attended the staff development for in the summer. I created a couple more “how-to” documents with print screens and directions.
November 2010:
This month’s internship hours focused mainly on a lesson for my class about cyber safety and cyber bullying. It is important for students to understand the risks involved in the use of the Internet, as well as the effects of cyber-bullying. I discussed the information put on personal profile pages, such as Facebook. Many of my students have Facebook or Myspace already at the age of 8 and 9. Also this month I spent time teaching another staff member how to use a program I have used many times that allows students to easily create podcasts. It is such an easy program to use, and although the other teacher was unconfident in her technology abilities, she was surprised at how simple the program was. I hope to find time to teach other staff members to use the program soon. Also this month I continued to update my classroom website, to increase parent-teacher communication.
December 2010:
This was a short month due to Winter break; however I was able to get some hours in for my internship. Our class went on a field trip to the Dallas Aquarium, and I was able to update my site and put pictures of our trip. This increases parent knowledge about what is going on in my class in a simple way. Many teachers are still having difficulty with the new grade book; therefore I spent some hours assisting teachers with inputting their grades. There has been an issue with the work-skills section in the kindergarten grades, as they don’t give the same kind of grades as other grade levels. I am hoping all the issues will be sorting out with the technology department before the next grading period ends.
January 2011:
Our campus got Promethean Boards installed in October this year. Many teachers are reluctant to use the new technology, and need training. Even I am learning new things about the program every month. A great amount of our curriculum is available as a Word file, and my technology facilitator showed my how to create a PDF file and import it into the program used for our smart boards. This has increased my use of the board, as well as my teammates because I have been helping them and sending them some files to use. I also showed another teacher how to do the simple process. Because of this I have already seen an increase in the use of the technology. I plan to create a step-by-step document and send it to the staff. Creating the list of questions to ask my technology facilitator was informational. I am excited to ask them and learn about how Mesquite goes about planning and budgeting, as well as creating the leadership and vision for technology in the district.
February 2011:
I had a great time with my projects this month. I planned a multi-media project in which the students in my class created a podcast from their procedural writing. We went through the writing process in partners, and the partners then created a podcast with pictures. I have found from my past experiences with Garageband and creating these podcasts that it is easier to take pictures using Photo Booth. The students LOVED the program and sharing the final podcasts with each other and another 3rd grade class. This project displayed work for Technology Facilitator Standard II: Planning and designing learning environments and experiences. During this project, I assisted my team member in doing it with her class as well.
I continued to update my classroom website and also helped a couple teachers with their promethean boards. I attended a C-Tech meeting, in which we learned about the new websites available for all students in the district.
March 2011: